Week 74. "Claro que sí"

 Hey y'all. Great things this week. Here's the highlights:

Juan - funny story. So we were knocking this trailer park and Juan answers. I ask how he's doing and he answers in Spanish. And so for the next minute we just small talk, me in English and him in Spanish, both understanding each other. Then my comp, who knows just as much Spanish as me, just goofed up and asked if he knew English. He replies with "Claro que sí." Which means of course. Harkness just had a brainfart or something, cause then he starts explaining in Spanish how we have missionaries who speak Spanish. Half way into it he realizes and we all just start laughing. 

We taught him about the Book of Mormon and handed him one. It was super awesome. 

Volleyball - the curse was broken! We had five youth show up! It was fun and they are starting to bring some friends. 

DC - the best thing to do as DL is ask someone else to teach. So I've been using my delegation skills well and it was fire. Elder Golden, who is the funniest sarcastic guy ever, taught and it was great. At the end he had us all share miracles we've seen on the mission and it was super cool. If you're ever feeling down or discouraged just think about the miracles you've seen and I'm sure you'll remember something that'll help you. 

Certified Shed Builder - not really, it was a build your own kit from Costco. So I pulled out all my years of experience building lego sets and following the instructions to make this shed. It's been 3 days and it's still standing so I'm taking that as a win. 

Robbie - we had an awesome lesson with her, went over the baptismal interview questions and watched a Book of Mormon video. And best of all she chose a date to be baptized! Super exciting. She said Feb 9th and transfers is the day before, so this is about to be interesting. 

Omar - he's a great guy, just not good at calling or texting back. Anywho, he finally did and we have an appointment with him today. If there's anyone to pray for its him. 

Protest - we were going home after a service and saw this protest. I don't know whats going on in the world, but they were protesting the Holocaust and Jewish cruelty. All in Spanish for some reason and with a marching band. It was wack, as far as I know that was almost a century ago. Video for proof below 

Taira - if any of y'all remember, Taira was my first baptism and she texted and decided to come up and visit since I was closer than my last area. It was super fun seeing her again. I forgot to take a picture with her, which is sad, but I did take a picture of the food she left us. It was a ton, it was awesome. Love her. 

Spiritual Thought - this was something I heard in Sunday school that I really liked. 

When questioning commandments or why they were given first look at the context. When you understand the context it can make understanding the commandment a lot easier. And no matter what, the main reason for every commandment is to make us holier and closer to God. 

I really liked that because a lot of people question some of our commandments, without fully understanding them or experiencing the blessings that come from keeping them. And as we do our best to explain, the Holy Ghost will help them to understand. I know that to be true. 

I love you all and I hope y'all have an amazing week! 

Pic/vid

https://photos.app.goo.gl/z7dirCtNafBwE58S7

Week 73. This is a great work

 One thing I forgot in last week's email was Saturday's breakfast. A member in the stk presidency feeds all the missionaries in the Zone. Afterwards we all played soccer in their backyard for 30 min. It was pretty fun. 

Anywho, here's the highlights for this week:

Jesse - we tracted into Jesse and he was super nice. Liked our message on eternal families and wanted us to come back. It was super cool and we should see him this week. 

accidental service then volleyball - we picked up 2 other Elders for volleyball, and so we were going to grab them, get dinner, and then play. But it turned out they were helping someone move, so we hopped in and it was pretty fun. And then nobody came for volleyball. I'm seeing a theme here and I don't like it. 

Shanda - she lives at an old member's address and asked us to come back. So we did... multiple times. They were just always busy doing something. So we finally got her number and will hopefully meet them this week. 

Exchanges on Friday - I went with Elder Sorensen in the Spanish area, but every person we met that day also spoke English, so that was nice. But I got to say hi to a couple of their friends and have beef stroganoff for dinner so that was awesome. 

what I missed - my companion and the other Elder went off. It worked perfectly. They were meeting with the random lady I talked about last week and apparently she didn't know as much English as we thought, but the Spanish Elder was able to answer all their questions about the purpose of life, how to repent, and more. I missed out on an awesome lesson but I'm so glad because I know it was all part of God's plan. 

Richard - we saw him Saturday and we were able to talk and share a message with him. The really cool thing was how much his attitude changed. Before his attitude was of someone who was trying it just because they had nothing else, but this time he sincerely wanted to listen and come to church. Sadly we couldn't find him a ride in time but we will next week. 

Spiritual thought - check my latest Facebook post

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid02tr5aj936w7SjNSmCmv7WpXZJmV4K1Br5CTJJSLZ5zQevxex6yEfhRXGKoy6d9SDtl&id=100072337090752&mibextid=Nif5oz

Love y'all! 

Week 72. Bada ba ba baaa... I'm lovin it

 Didn't write in my journal this week sadly but I remember all the good parts. Here are the highlights:

Volleyball - instead of getting showed up, we just got canceled. The relief society was holding something so we canceled it. So hopefully this week won't be 0/3

District Council - we had it with interviews which was super awesome and nice. And it was honestly a good district council. I asked two missionaries to run us through a social media exercise and from that Harkness found someone and we referred him off to another pair of missionaries. It was cool. 

Zone Conference - the next day was zone Conference which was also fire. They talked a lot about the new focus our mission President wants us to have. It's these 13 methods of finding people to teach. It's pretty good. But the part I liked the most was when we split up into our individual zones and our zone did a blessing from a pen. I just call it a Letter to God. First I wrote Him my thoughts and feelings, then I wrote back to myself what I felt He would say to me. It was something I really needed and I was so grateful for it. 

Robbie -  we saw her that night and had an amazing dinner with her and Bruce. Afterwards we talked about baptism and when her's was going to be. We asked her to pick a date then pray to ask God whether it be right. We'll be asking her how it went soon. 

Temple - on Friday I was able to go to the temple again and do some work there. I love the temple and I can't wait until I'll have one closer to me. 

Splits - on Saturday we went on a 5hr split with one of the Spanish Elders. I stayed in our area with Elder Golden. He's a super funny kid and a nerd too, so we had a great time going out and talking with others and each other. A cool miracle is that at one apt complex we were knocking, this lady invited us inside to share a message and told us her whole backstory and how she is trying to find the answer about where Justice and Mercy meet. So we talked for a bit and left our number so hopefully she'll reach out soon. 

Random Lady - another lady who I forgot to ask her name. We met her before Christmas and she really appreciated us stopping by because she was in a slump. 

Fast forward to Sunday, we see her again and she is super excited to meet with us again. She did say she preferred the Sisters so we'll be bringing them over this Friday so hopefully all goes well. 

Spiritual thought - I just wanted to talk about what we shared with Robbie. It comes from Ether 2 and 3. God is leading a group of people to build vessels to cross the ocean. He directed his prophet on how they should be built and work, until the very end when they just had 2 more things to work out. The first was the problem with air since they were meant to be airtight as the waves crashed over them. The Lord replies and tells him how to fix that problem. But the second problem was how they were going to have light, to which the Lord asked what His prophet would have Him do. 

We can ask in faith and have our prayers answered, just like the first problem. But sometimes God wants us to learn and exercise our faith to try and come up with our own solution. The Prophet had such faith that not only did the idea he brought to the Lord work, but he had enough faith to see Him. 

If you're praying and not receiving an answer, maybe try coming up with your own plan and then ask God and listen how the Spirit directs. Answers come to those who not only seek, but knock too. 

Love y'all here are some pics

Week 71. Saving the Meek and Destroying the Wicked

 Hey guys! It's your favorite missionary, or not, but I won't hold that against you because you're still a real one. This week we did a lot of visiting less actives and cold contacting, here are the highlights:

Richard - Honestly the highlight of the week. He's this dude that first requested to meet with missionaries to help with his drinking problem and find peace with the afterlife. Except the missionaries at the time never called him. So we have talked with him a few times and he wasn't too into it since he tried the "church route" on his own and didn't get too much from it. So we explained to him what we believed and how as you get to understand God more and what kind of person He is, and how He truly is our loving heavenly Father, that we can feel the peace and joy we are trying to. He really liked that and was willing to give it another try with us.

Volleyball - That night we were starting a volleyball night with the youth to get them involved in some missionary work. except they all just showed us up. We waited the whole hour and then went home. I gave them crap about it on Sunday and so we'll see if they show up this Tuesday.

Wood choppin - It's one of my favorite services to do. We were helping a less active and it was pretty great. I forgot to take a pic of the wood but afterwards he took us down to his private pond and let us cast a line in for a bit on his sketchy dock. It literally moved with the wind.

Destroying the Wicked - I found it very funny but because of that, a lot of you might not, so this is what happened. We were knocking random doors and came to this dude's house. Before we say anything this dude starts chuckling to himself. Me and Harkness look at each other because we know what this means. We told him we are missionaries sharing messages teaching about Christ and sharing uplifting and hopeful messages, and asked if he wanted to hear one. I was really hoping he'd say no because I knew Harkness' tolerance was real low at the end of the day. Instead this man says, "No, but I'd love to talk about all the (I'm not sure what word he used but I'm assuming it meant Inconsistencies in our belief)." Which was funny because then he asked us what church we were from. To turn it away from a bash I asked him what he believed and he said nothing, to which Harkness said, "Not even yourself?" (inside I was cheering. that man got roasted so hard). He tried backtracking saying he believed in being rational and then said that his wife would really love to be there when he "proved us wrong" so we should come by a different time. I don't know what kinda morals you got to have to like attacking peoples beliefs which are only to uplift and bring hope to others, but at least his wife supports him.

     It was really nice though because right after that this super nice christian invited us in and we chatted for a bit. He gave me three holocaust books. People in Washington are wack

Pickleball - They have this big outside covered pickleball courts and so sometimes we go there and play and try talking to others. But like normal people look at you weird when you try and be social for some reason so it normally doesn't work, but this week I played with some college students and they invited me to play with them again next week so that was pretty cool.

Spiritual Thought - So my spiritual thought today is pretty basic but something I believe to be very powerful when you ponder about it. It comes from Alma 32:21

 "And now as I said concerning faith—faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true."

A lot of people struggle with faith because they believe they don't know it or they set the bar super high, but faith isn't knowledge, it's hope. It doesn't matter how much of it you have, it doesn't matter if you have a perfect knowledge. You just have to hope and trust. And as you do the truth will be shown unto you. As you continue to hope for things, God will be there, and that will grow your trust in Him. Faith is hoping that God will be there for you and trusting that He will know how best to do that. It starts off small but it can grow bigger as you work on it. If any of you are working on growing your faith, or want to, the first step is hope. I as you try I can promise that peace and joy will fill your soul and warm your heart.

I love y'all and I hope you have a good week

pics

Hansen found my phone 

And pond 

Week 70. The Beginning of the End

 This week marks the end of my blackout year (the full year of being a missionary) and the beginning of the 2023, the year I finish. Sadly I wrote half of my journal this week last night so a lot of the stories were lost but here's what I remember: 

Maguires - talked about baptism with Ashley again and what that typically looks like. She said she is so ready to officially become part of the church and uphold our/her beliefs. Then her son, who also wants to be baptized, was talking about how he wished his extended family knew about the Gospel and how much it could bless them. The testimony of kids is so awesome!

Haleys - we taught Robbie all the commandments. It was pretty good and she understood all of it. She's not looking forward to no tea but is willing to make the sacrifice which is awesome. She said next week she wanted to set a baptismal date!

Patrica - this is just something funny. We were looking at old contacts and found Patrica. Me and Harkness had a small debate on her name and it turned out we were both wrong. It's pronounced Pa-tree-sa.

MLC - DLs got invited again. The whole instruction was mainly focused on how we can lead DCs. It'll be a bit confusing to change things up but the changes seem like it will be very good. 

Best Costco Pizza - we went shopping and had this great idea. We bought a rotisserie chicken, bacon bits, BBQ sauce, and a cheese pizza. Went home combined it all and had a super awesome pizza

Worst resolution ever - it was Harkness' idea to do the 75 day challenge. For those of you who don't know what it is, everyday we have to do two 45 min workouts, drink 1 gallon of water, and have a diet. We added a few other things for missionary work, but the real kicker is that if we fail one day we have to start back at day 1. 

I've probably had more water in the past 4 days than I have my whole mission. 

ZLC - probably one of the funnest ZLCs I've had. We goofed but also made a really good plan and supported one another. It's going to be a fun month. 

P day - we went hiking to Oyster Dome lookout. In total it was a 6 mile hike and took our group 6 hrs. A little bit longer but fun. 

Spiritual Thought - I was reading Joseph Smith's History, one of his accounts on the first vision, and found the formula he used to receive his answer. 

Moroni 7:6 says that when you "pray unto God, except [you] shall do it with real intent it profiteth [you] nothing.

As I read Joseph's account I saw the steps required for real intent and I wanted to share them. 

1. Desire

2. Reflection 

3. Personal Effort

4. Read the word of God

5. Pray

6. Determination 

And that equals number 

7. Divine Help

First we need to have a desire, Alma the prophet taught that even a desire to have a desire is enough. Then reflect, ask yourself what you have done and what you can now do. Next is to do it. If we expect God to do everything for us we are wrong, but He will help us as we do it. In Joseph's case he guided him into the scriptures. The scriptures and prophets' words or both resources where God has spoken to us. Your answer or help that you need might already be there, you just have to search for it. As you do the steps required when you pray an answer will come, but it's not always in our timing which is why we must stay determined and keep searching and asking and when the time is right we will receive divine help. 

I know this to be true, these steps changed the course of History, they changed the course of my life and they can do the same for yours. If you have a question, or need God's help please use these steps and I can promise His hand will be present in your life. 

I love you all and I wish you the best of luck with your New Year resolutions. 

Here are the pics